Thrive Festival 2020 gets everyone feeling better

Thrive Festival 2020 has come to an end for another year and what a great show it was!

The Convention Centre really is one of the premium spots for an event in Dublin. Because, for one of the busiest events of the year in terms of logistics, they managed to make it look like the most organised of events on the calendar. And from what we saw, it was!

Small rooms dedicated to talks, larger rooms for yoga classes, mezzanine levels for demonstrations, big hall spaces for (large and very well attended) classes. And a foyer that looked liked it housed band new shiney cars every day, just like that.

Mazda Ireland were one of the corporate sponsors and we couldn;t help notice the new, vibrant orange Mazda MX5 convertible sitting out in the sunshine in front of the building. We had a job trying to get our team through the door and past that one!

Our very own Motoring Correspondent Greg Gaughran found it difficult to leave it out there all on it’s own!

But once we managed to get inside, we were greeted by bunch of helpful staff handing out timetables and itineraries and we did start to wonder where we would start…

So, we started with the exhibitors and were delighted to see some of our favourite brands here at Wasted.

Tenzing Ireland were there in force with smiles larger than life (that will be the natural energy, we suppose!). They were excited to tell us about new launches and big plans, but then swore us to secrecy about the details….! Keep tuned to Wasted.ie over the next few weeks to hear more!

Our great friend a champion of all things Zero Waste, Pat Kane from Reuzi was in the house, giving talks about Plastic Pollution and how we can all find ways to become more sustainable in our everyday lives. Pat is blazing a trail at these events and we love her for it!

Revive Active were there of course, showing us how we can get our daily dose of vitamins, energy and general well-being packed into us every day, in one small sachet! We love this product and it’s great seeing these guys at all these events.

Nuasan were new to us, but we liked the cut of their gib when we started chatting, so we wanted to find out more.

Turns out, they are a range of natural, sustainable body care products. For most of us, in the past, it was virtually impossible to get natural body products that did the same job as the large cosmetic brands, so we were forced to chose between our ethics and….well, not so nice body odour (sorry!).

But Nuasan seem to have this issue sorted. Their natural body wipes are made up of 98% natural ingredients (I wasn’t sure if the wipes are biodegradable, but I asked post event and they are – made from plant base fibres!). I like the notion of being able to freshen up on the go, without resorting to store bought wipes, but I what particularly like about this company is that they seem to be genuinely committed to the future of our planet. 75% of their bottles are made from recycled plastic (and working on more), 10% of their profits are donated to climate action groups and their HQ is powered by entirely by wind power. 🙂

Meaghers Pharmacy is one of Dublin’s well known and well loved pharmacy, originally from Baggot St. They were on hand this weekend to talk about supplements and vitamins with their expert Kevin answering all of our many questions. They were also taking the opportunity to showcase their best selling product – Sypmprove, which is a probiotic that promises to do wonderful things for our gut health.

Gut Health seems to be a recurring theme throughout the event.  Kelloggs had a floor dedicated to their new range of ‘Happy gut’ cereals, which seem to be a re-take of All bran meets Special K, meets…granola? Well, whatever I had, it was delicious and I’ll be stocking up on my next trip to Dunnes 🙂

There were various talks about gut health, but we missed most of them, along with the exercise classes, because we were too busy talking to this guy…

The Sweet Potato Pizza Company. There is too such a thing! Craig Grattan discovered this fabulous food wonder when he was mucking about looking for alternatives to ‘cheat meals’ by way of a pizza.

Already a big fan of the sweet potato, he wondered if it would work. And it did. Stocked primarily in Supervalu across the country, Craig is expanding into more independent retailers quickly. He couldn’t keep these pieces of deliciousness cooked quickly enough on Saturday for the punters lining up to try them. I had two slices. Okay, three. I’ll be stopping by Supervalu on my way home from Dunnes in order to stock up on the ones with sundried tomato, onion and spinach. And probably cheese :).

And yes, there were loads and loads more of fabulous and wonderful companies and brands here this weekend, but we just don’t have enough space to feature them all.

All in all, it was a really terrific success, a terribly enjoyable weekend and a true credit to the girls in Equinox for pulling it all together. We can’t wait for next year already!  Thanks to all involved,

The Wasted Team!